Home
by Rivulet027
Summary: Troy isn't sure about the new house, the new family or his past. Rocky tries to reassure him.


Disclaimer: I own nothing to do with Power Rangers. They aren't my toy box and I'm merely playing.

A/N: For pockythoughts, since she gave me the bunny and looked it over for me! Thank you so much! I borrowed the idea about Casey from angel_negra. Thank you!

Home:

Troy slows his steps as he hits the driveway. He pauses to try the mailbox and tries to tell himself he's not stalling. He frowns at the empty mailbox and closes it as he regards the house. He can still hear Emma telling all of them to have a safe trip home.

It annoys him that her words have unnerved him enough that he's taking each step slowly as he wonders how long he'll stay here. The Olivers seem nice, but he hasn't been with them long enough to know much about them except that they're retired and have raised several children and sent them off to college. There is a small ridiculous part of him that wants to trust that him ending up with them after they'd settled into their new home is a good thing, but he knows better. They've recently downsized to a cozy ranch house in the middle of an older development and seem to be working their way through the activity the senior center offers. How long are they going to want to keep a teenager while they're settling into retirement?

His eyes widen and a cold chill runs through him as he reaches for the door. They'd briefly mentioned living in Angel Grove when there were monsters there. Would they move if monsters started showing up regularly here? As a power ranger he'd have to fight those monsters, he might be called away at odd hours and…they weren't going to want to keep him for very long. Troy pushes the disappointment away. Why does he still feel that? Why after all this time does he still get his hopes up? He'll figure out a way to get through this, he tells himself. He always does.

He pushes his way inside, closing the door behind him before moving into the kitchen to find some food. Mrs. Oliver is going through the mail, but she pauses to toss him an apple and ask how his day was.

Troy shrugs, "First day of school."

"That good or that bad?" she pushes.

He shrugs again, dropping his backpack in a chair at the dining room table and takes a bit of his apple instead of answering.

"Make any friends?"

"Too early to tell."

"Any interesting sports or clubs?"

"Maybe," he tries as he takes another bite of his apple.

She raises her eyebrows and he's resists the temptation to shrug again. She smiles and shakes her head, "Well Roger is exploring the possibilities of a poker group so it's just you and me so I was thinking we'd save the leftovers until tomorrow and order in. Does that sound good?"

Troy wants to tease her about ordering out not really fitting in with her and her husbands healthy lifestyles, but he swallows the words and nods instead.

She pulls several menus out of drawer near the refrigerator and leaves them on the counter before grabbing a letter that is leaning against the fruit, "This just came for you so enjoy and when you're done if you could see what interests you for dinner I'd appreciated it."

"Sure," he agrees as he takes the letter.

She pats him on the back as she walks away teasing, "I'll be in the living room deciding what movie to torture you with."

Shaking his head Troy looks at the letter and then rips it open with a smile.

"Who's it from?" she asks from the living room.

"Casey," he answers, wanting to say that the older boy may be the closet thing he has to a brother. He steps closer to the living room as he answers her, "I met him when I was eight, didn't get to know him for long before he finished high school. He teaches Kung Fu now."

No need to tell her that Casey teaches as some super secret academy that he doesn't really talk about. Most of his letters are about the antics his students or friends got into. He skims the letter and grins, "His friend Theo has this brother Luan and Luan…"

Troy can't help but shake his head and smile.

"You're leaving me in suspense here."

"Theo and Luan are identical twins and their friend Flit thought Luan was Theo and Luan didn't correct him when Flit put him to work at the pizza place their friend RJ owns. Casey says there was flour everywhere."

Mrs. Oliver laughs, "That sounds like a mess."

Troy nods and smiles at her before tucking the letter into his pocket to finish later, "Decide on anything?"

"What do you feel like?"

Troy blinks at her.

"I'm not really going to torture you," she prompts, "Unless you have a hidden love for Katharine Hepburn that I don't know about."

"Who?" Tory asks helplessly.

"I'll take that as a now, go get the menus, we'll figure something out."

He's finishing up his math homework when Rocky calls him asking him how his first day of school was.

"It wasn't my fault," Troy grumbles.

"I wasn't asking about your last first day at school, we've already hashed out that entire situation," Rocky reassures before he points out, "I'm asking about this first day at school."

Troy isn't sure what to tell him. Confess that he's agreed to be a power ranger and Rocky will likely think Troy's hallucinating. How much trouble will being a power ranger get him into? He hates disappointing Rocky. Maybe he was hallucinating?

"Troy?" Rocky pushes, the concern in his tone bringing Troy back to their conversation.

"It was a first day," he tries.

"And…" Rocky prompts.

"I might have made some friends?"

"And…"

"I don't know yet," Troy admits.

Rocky stays silent for a moment, clearly giving him space to elaborate. Troy sets his pencil down and pokes at his calculator.

"How are you doing otherwise?"

"I-I'm okay," Troy tries, "How long do you think I'll stay here?"

"Long enough for you to shatter all your illusions about me," Rocky smiles, "Though when you eventually meet Tommy I'd hope you not judge me by him."

"Who?"

"The guy they raised in Angel Grove, we were friends in high school," Rocky elaborates.

"Which is how you know they're good people?" Troy pushes as he tries to think of the pictures he's seen around the house, "Wait is he that dorky looking one with the long hair?"

"That would be the one," Rocky laughs.

"Wait, did you have long hair too?"

"Worse," Rocky confesses, mock horror in his voice, "I thought vests were shirts."

Troy laughs, "That's horrible, vests?"

"Yes, vests."

"No way," Troy smiles as he tries to picture Rocky, the one adult who's been a constant in his life wearing a vest as a shirt, "No, I can't imagine that."

"Well I think Aisha still has pictures, but I suspect they're for blackmailing purposes only."

"But I've had a rough year," Troy tries, "I need something to brighten my day."

"You have," Rocky agrees, "I'll see what I can do."

Troy sits back, wondering why he's brought up the one thing he's refused to talk to Rocky about and sighs, "You're going to make me talk about this, aren't you?"

"When you're ready," Rocky tells him, "But I am planning on stopping by later this week to see how you're settling in."

Troy scuffs his toe across the floor and grumbles, "I've already talked about this. Did she get in trouble?"

"Which she?"

"Ms. Morris only thought she was helping," Troy says quietly, not sure if he wants to know if she got into trouble or not.

"Did she?"

"I didn't think my mom would be looking for me if she didn't want to see me," Troy confesses, the words falling out of him slowly, "I know better, but I just wanted to try. Then she, I think she thought my dad would've found me by now, but I don't know why when apparently he didn't even know about me and she didn't even care when I called because she found out he died. I thought about googling him, but every time I try to I just can't."

Troy pauses to suck in a slow breath and wipe at the tears on his face. He stares at his desk as he listens to Rocky reassure him, "You don't have to come over here, it's late."

"It's not that late," Rocky tells him.

"I'm fine."

"Troy."

Troy groans and pushes himself out of the chair so he can flop down on his bed, "It was stupid."

"It wasn't stupid."

"I knew better," Troy growls as he curls up in on himself, "I knew better and I still did it."

"You know more about your past now," Rocky tries to point out.

"What good is knowing that some guy name Mike Corbett is probably my dad when he's dead?"

"Mike Corbett?" Rocky repeats.

"Yeah."

"D-did she say how he died?"

"The whole Terra Venture thing was a screw up and he died in the first mission?" Tory tries.

"What do you know about Terra Venture?"

"Just what they make you know in school," Troy grumbles, "Do we have to talk about this?"

"No, no we don't."

"Thanks," Troy sighs.

"You're welcome."

"Look, I'll see you Friday, right?" Tory tries.

"Troy."

"I'm really tired. I had a long day, my homework is done and I just want to go to sleep, okay?" Troy pushes, not liking how he's almost whining at the end.

"Okay," Rocky agrees, "but if you need me I'm here."

"I know."

* * *

Jake finds him the moment he walks through the door, wraps an arm around his shoulder and grins, "There you are!"

"Here I am," Troy agrees cautiously.

"I have bagels," Jake tempts, "So I figure we go meet Noah, then find Gia and Emma and make plans."

"Plans for what?" Gia interrupts as she approaches them. Emma is going through her backpack as she follows Gia over to them.

Jake holds up his bag of bagels and Troy is grateful that this means Jake releases him.

"Well I-um…" Jakes starts to stumble as he stares at Gia.

Troy glances at him, wondering what the problem is. He looks at Gia and she shrugs as she steals half of Emma's books.

"Hey, I can carry those," Emma protests.

"But I always carry these to class for you," Gia smirks.

Emma looks at the books and steals the biology one back and hands her the math, "You could probably be in AP Bio too."

"I wanted Chem," Gia tells her.

Emma shrugs.

"So did you ask?" Noah says as a greeting.

"Ask what?" Troy pushes as he takes his team in. His team. Defiantly not a hallucination.

"Well I'm great on the field, but not so much with this fighting thing and don't get me wrong the suit seems to help, but you and Gia seem to know what your doing so…"

"Lessons," Gia nods.

"We'll have to figure out everyone's schedules," Troy agrees, "but that's a good idea."

"It's a great idea," Emma puts in.

"So bagels and plotting?" Jake suggests.

"Bagels and a plan of attack," Gia agrees as she takes the bagels, "Come on we don't have much time before first period."

Troy follows as Gia leads all of them through the hallway. He takes each one of them in slowly and wonders how he can feel so comfortable with them all so quickly, why he's grateful for the move for the first time since it happened. He pushes his questions about himself aside as Gia takes them to a nice sized room filled with costumes, props and thankfully chairs. They settle in to eat their bagels and plan how to save the world.


End file.
